


Nightmares and Emotional Tethers

by sofaritsalright



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-24
Updated: 2016-03-05
Packaged: 2018-04-16 23:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4643880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sofaritsalright/pseuds/sofaritsalright
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After weeks of endless nightmares, Lydia finally leaves her own home and goes to Stiles for comfort. What he doesn't know is that this would be the night that would change their friendship forever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Unexpected Visitor

On a particularly boring night in Beacon Hills, Stiles tossed and turned over in his sleep. He wasn't sure what was making him so restless, but he wasn't a big fan of it at all. For once, there was a week of peace in their town and for some reason, it drove the boy crazy. He loved cracking codes and theories, but he also liked his own time to do whatever and have a night off every once in awhile. But this particular night, he hated every single second that ticked by and he couldn't wait to see the clock hit 6:30 so he could get up and go to school.

The boredom kicked Stiles harder than ever as he wasted the night in sighs and grunts when he realized only a short time had passed since he last checked the clock beside his bed. As he looked at it for what seemed like the millionth time that night, he realized that the clock had finally hit 2:30 and just then, he heard rapid knocks on his window. Stiles jumped at first, but quickly got out of bed, hoping that it'd be Scott or Derek and they'd need to whisk him away for some werewolf adventure. Instead, when he opened up his blinds, he saw a familiar strawberry blonde on the other side of the glass. "Lydia," he mumbled as he opened up his window and helped her through. The girl looked like she had one hell of a night; her beautiful hair was tangled in knots and she had puffy, red cheeks along with red eyes. "Hey, you okay?" He asked in a concerning manner as soon as her feet hit the floor.

Instead of responding, Lydia wrapped her arms around the boys waist and laid her head into his chest. At first, this motion took Stiles by surprise, but soon he hugged her back and ran his hand down her hair to calm her down. "Lyds, w-what happened?"

Lydia stayed quiet as the stood in the middle of Stiles' room. After a few shaky breaths, the girl mumbled into his chest. "Can I stay here tonight?"

"Yeah, of course. C'mon." Stiles didn't even have to think twice about it. He would do anything Lydia needed — it had always been that way and it always would remain the same. Stiles carefully stepped back over to his bed with his arms still around the girls small frame. "You get comfy, I'll stay on the floor or something, alright?"

"Stiles," Lydia sighed as she unlatched herself from the boy and climbed up on the bed, "you're not sleeping on the floor." She rolled her glassy, red eyes and crawled over to the side that hadn't been slept on and got under the covers. He stared at her, wondering what had been so bad that she was suggesting sleeping in the same bed. "Stiles!" She snapped with a groan. She wasn't in the mood and all she wanted to do was get some sleep for once.

The boy listened and quickly got into his usual spot on his bed. Though it was awkward at first, he didn't let it both him as soon as Lydia moved in closer and laid her head on his chest. He knew something was wrong at first sight, but this made it much worse than it was before. The boy decided to save his questions for the next morning and instead rubbed his hand up and down her back until she fell asleep. If Stiles couldn't fall asleep before, he sure as hell wasn't going to now.


	2. Lingering Confusion

A few hours later, the two friends were jumping awake at the alarm clock. Stiles swore that he had only just shut his eyes. He remembers that because he was going to shut off the alarm before it had a chance to wake Lydia out of her peaceful sleep. But, instead, the world worked against him yet again and the two jumped awake and whined at the sunlight that was peaking through the window. Lydia immediately went from sitting straight up to leaning back down and pushing her face into the pillow. Stiles chuckled a little; he had always imagined Lydia Martin being a morning person. She always seemed to have a skip in her step at school and was wide awake each morning even when Stiles and Scott were dragging their feet. "Sorry- about the alarm." Stiles winced at his words as he rubbed the back of his neck and slid out of bed to check if his dad was up yet. He wasn't exactly sure how the sheriff would react to seeing the pretty redhead in his bed. "Lydia?" Stiles whispered, trying to get the girl to get up again.

She popped her head back up and blinked in his direction. Stiles forgot what he was going to say as he stared at her. The usually well put together Lydia was a mess in front of him. Her make-up was smeared, her hair was like a birds nest, and she looked more tired than he had ever seen anyone look before. "I'm so tired," she said in a coarse voice, making Stiles weak in the knees.

"I know, and I'm sorry, but you need to-" The boy was cut off mid-sentence by his father opening his door. Stiles scrunched up his face and turned around. "Dad, good morning." He smiled and nodded his head.

The sheriff eyed up the situation and looked at his son with disappointment. "Good morning, Lydia."

Lydia's face flushed of all color. "Good morning, Sheriff Stilinski." She cleared her throat and sat up straight while running a hand through her hair to straighten out the snarls.

The sheriff nodded towards the hallway to motion his son to follow him. Before leaving, Stiles took a glance at Lydia to see if she was up for the morning or not and headed outside, shutting the door behind him. "Dad, this is not what it looks like." Stiles promised his dad. "Something happened and she needed a friend. Nothing happened, I swear."

The sheriff shook his head and let out a sigh, not knowing what to say at this point. "Is she in trouble?"

His son shrugged. "I honestly don't know. She didn't want to talk. She just wanted to sleep."

"And nothing happened?"

"Dad," Stiles scoffed, "nothing happened."

With that, the sheriff walked away with his coffee and headed back to his own room to get ready for the day. After his door closed, Stiles ran back to his room, but upon opening the door, he found out the Lydia was nowhere to be found. The window was opened again, making him realize that she had slipped out during the quick conversation he had with his father. Stiles sighed and sat down on his bed before getting dressed for school. He didn't know what was going on with the girl, but he wanted to get the bottom of it before Lydia got too exhausted.

During their lunch break, Stiles wandered over to his regular table to see a smiling and bright Lydia, laughing at something that Isaac had said. Stiles rolled his eyes and inched closer to the table to sit down beside Scott. He looked across the table, wondering how she had undergone a complete one-eighty in the time since he saw her. Her hair was pin straight and her skin was glowing radiantly. She was nothing like she was when they had woken up that morning. Or like how he saw her last night. "Lydia?" Stiles pursed his lips together and tapped his foot. The girl looked up at him with a sparkle in her eyes. "Can we talk?" The girl nodded and stood up to follow the boy. After they were far enough away from their now suspicious friends, he leaned in and whispered. "What is going on?" He crossed his arms and waited for an answer.

Lydia shrugged and mimicked his body language. "I haven't been feeling right lately. I just needed some sleep." Her voice was small, like a child who had just gotten into trouble. Stiles mentally slapped himself for making her feel like that. He wasn't mad, he was just curious.

The boy nodded. "What do you mean you haven't been feeling right lately? Supernatural-y?" He raised his eyebrows in suspicion, not knowing how else to explain it.

"Maybe," Lydia shrugged, "I'm not sure. I've been having these nightmares, okay? That's it. I just needed someone." She looked up at him with her big, Bambi eyes. "Thank you for being that someone, Stiles." And with a firm hand on the boys shoulder, she walked away back over to their table.

Stiles rolled his eyes, still confused about the whole ordeal. He always thought that Allison would be the one that she would go to in the middle of the night if Lydia needed help with anything. Why would she choose him? It's not that he minded it in the slightest, but there was something so confusing about the whole thing and for once, he couldn't wrap his head around it. Instead of going back to the table after Lydia did, he stood there in silence trying to put together all the pieces. Obviously she didn't want to talk about it, but she probably needed to tell someone - anyone. And Stiles felt like he was the perfect candidate. Still, minutes passed and his best friend noticed and strolled over to him.

Scott's face scrunched up immediately at the situation and shook his head. "What's going on?"

"I would like to know the same fricken' thing," Stiles said as he placed his hands on his hips and walked away, leaving Scott just as confused as everyone else in the situation.


	3. Torn to Shreds

Stiles had spent the last three nights staying up until dawn waiting for Lydia to come back, but she never did. For all he knew, she went to seek comfort from Jackson or Allison instead. Though he was getting sleep deprived, he stayed up waiting for her just one more night. He was starting to hear colors at this point after only getting a few hours of sleep the previous nights, but it was all for Lydia. The only thing he wanted to know was that she was safe - that's all that mattered to the boy, anyway. He wanted to protect her in anyway that he could and the thought of her coming to him when she was upset made him feel special for once in their friendship. Hell, he had been in love with her since the third grade and the fact that she sought comfort in Stiles made him feel incredible.

Just as the boy was dazing off, he heard the branches move and the tap on the window that he'd been waiting for. He immediately flew out of bed and opened it up for her. He was smiling as she came inside, but the smile faded as soon as she moved her strawberry blonde hair out of her face. The girl had obviously been crying and there were obvious scratches running down her entire body. It looked like she had been attacked by something or somebody. Stiles opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. Seeing her hurt and confused was the worst and it devastated him more than ever. Instead of speaking, he pulled her close to him and kissed the top of her head. The girl silently sobbed into his chest and he walked the two of them backwards to his bed.

After awhile of standing there and stroking the girls back, she lifted her head and wiped the tears off of her face. "I'm sorry," she apologized with a crack in her voice. "I am so sorry for this." She shook her head and took a step backwards as if Stiles was repelled by the sight of her.

"Lydia, come here." He said softly with a face full of concern and sympathy. "Can you tell me what happened?"

The girl shook her head and went to look in the mirror in order to wipe away the excess mascara that was now all over her cheeks and under her eyes. She felt Stiles walk up behind her and she looked at him through the mirror with genuine confusion. "Stiles, I have no idea what happened. One moment I'm in bed, fast asleep. The next I'm bloody and in the middle of the woods." She shrugged and put her hair up in a messy bun.

"That doesn't make sense," Stiles told her while trying to think of all the possible reasons.

The girl scoffed. "We live in Beacon Hills, Stiles. Of course it doesn't make sense, but there has to be an answer."

Stiles shot his eyes over to the board in his room where he would spend hours trying to figure out certain mysteries and going-on's in the town of Beacon Hills. It always drove him crazy. He knew how to make quite a few connections and loved the challenge of figuring it all out, but as he peered back over at Lydia, he knew that he actually had to start all over again. This wasn't just any werewolf scheme; it was a scheme involving Lydia and Stiles had no idea what to make of it. As badly as he wanted to start investigating further into it, he realized that the beautiful redhead was now yawning, but still a bloody mess. He let out a reluctant sigh and held out his hand for her to take. "Let's get you cleaned up," he said as she gripped onto him and headed towards the bathroom door.

With the bright lights in the bathroom, Stiles first could see the fact that Lydia was turning pale and was sweating profusely. For a split second, he realized he had never seen Lydia sweat before, but quickly knocked that thought out of his head. As he looked further, he could see that she had claw marks up and down her arms and legs. He shook his head, seeing that it looked as if the creature was trying to tear her to shreds. "Lydia," he said slowly, "we need to go to the hospital."

Lydia's eyes started to water once more. She didn't think it was that bad, but she hadn't been able to see how bad her wounds are. For the most part, her body had gone into shock. If she would've looked earlier, she probably would've run to the hospital instead of to the Stilinski household, but she didn't want to think about it. She just wanted to see Stiles. The moment she started crying, Stiles leaned down and placed a kiss on her head before scurrying out of the bathroom and back into his room. The boy grabbed a pair of sweatpants and a sweater for Lydia while calling Scott. Luckily, Scott answered, even though he was pissed off at how late it was.

" _What_?" Scott hissed.

Stiles didn't have time to explain, so instead he summed up the situation. "It's Lydia. I'm taking her to the hospital. Meet me there. This is serious, Scott."

" _Okay. I'll be there._ "

With that, the conversation ended and Stiles was back in the bathroom to collect Lydia. He threw the extra clothes in a bag and helped her out to his car. He didn't even think about waking up his father at that point - Lydia was too important. If the sheriff woke up before Stiles could get back then Stiles would definitely get in trouble, but he hoped that the sheriff would understand in the slightest.


	4. Hospital Shock

It took ten minutes to get to the hospital from Stiles' house. Ten minutes of pure silence. Ten minutes of peering over at Lydia making sure she was still awake and breathing. Ten minutes of panic on Stiles' part. It felt as if he couldn't drive fast enough and every few seconds Stiles would mentally curse himself out for waiting so long to take her. It was too dark in his room and he couldn't see her clearly, but Stiles thought that instinct should've set in immediately, but he wasn't thinking too fast on his feet after nights of depriving himself of sleep.

By the time the two pulled into the parking lot in front of the ER doors, Scott and Isaac were already waiting for the pair to arrive. Stiles groaned at the sight of Isaac; it wasn't that he disliked him or anything like that, but he asked for Scott, not other members of the pack. The two teenage boys ran to the passenger side of the car as soon as they saw Lydia through the windshield and as they opened the door to help her out, they both exchanged panicked looks with Stiles as they helped her out of the car and walked her to the door.

Immediately, Melissa was there to help out. She looked shocked, but Scott reminded her once more about all the supernatural creatures in town. There weren't just werewolves and banshees - it went a lot deeper than that. Melissa collected herself and took Lydia into a private room and left the boys to wait outside.

Stiles started pacing back and forth in the hallway outside of her door while Isaac and Scott took a seat on the ground. Scott sighed, "What happened, man?" He looked at Stiles with sympathy and his friend just shrugged at the answer.

"I don't know," he snapped. "I don't know. She keeps showing up at my window crying. This time was different, though. She had never been attacked like this before."

After what felt like forever, Melissa emerged from the girls' room and Stiles was right at her side the second she did. She placed her hand on the boys arm to assure him that Lydia was going to be alright, but Stiles urged her to speak up and tell them what was going on. "I found this," Melissa said as she pulled a small object from her pocket. She handed it over to Scott and he tried to analyze it, but he'd never seen such a thing before.

Scott squinted as he looked at the sharp object and shook his head. "Is this a claw?"

Isaac scratched his head. "If it is, it's definitely not from a wolf."

Scott looked over at his best friend who was fully worried about the girl inside the door behind them. Scott spoke in a soft voice, trying to calm the boy down a bit. "Stiles, I think we should call Deaton." Scott nodded his head and pulled out his phone. "You go see Lydia, and we'll take this to Deaton."

Stiles nodded once and headed down the hallway without a single word. Nothing else mattered right now, not even the fact that his dad was calling to yell at him for up and leaving in the middle of the night. "Dad," Stiles answered his phone and immediately braced himself to be scolded. After about thirty seconds, Stiles cut him off. "Dad, I'm fine. I'm at the hospital with Lydia. She got pretty beat up. We're not sure by what - or who - but I had to leave." He listened as Sheriff Stilinski went off on him for not waking him up, but they both knew that when Stiles had his mind set on Lydia, there was nothing else in the world that mattered. "I don't know if she's alright or not, but I'm at her door, alright? I gotta go." Without a goodbye, Stiles hung up and entered the boring, dim hospital room to spot his friend lying on an uncomfortable bed. "Lyds?" He whispered, not wanting to wake her up if she was asleep.

The girls eyes fluttered open, but it seemed as if her eyelids were too heavy to remain open. Stiles accepted the fact that they might've given get quite a few medications and sat down next to her on a chair and grabbed her hand. There was no way he was leaving her side, even if that meant staying up all night and skipping school tomorrow in order to make sure she was alright.


	5. The Claw

" _I got a fear in my blood._  
 _She was carried up into the clouds, high above._  
 _If you bled, I bleed the same._  
 _If you're scared, I'm on my way._  
 _Did you run away, did you run away?_  
 _I don't need to know._  
 _If you ran away, if you ran away,_  
 _come back home._  
 _Just come home._ "

-"Where's My Love" by SYML

**x-x-x**

Two days later, Lydia was let out of the hospital. Deaton had called his people about the claw, but they hadn't heard a word from him since. In effort to help her out, the pack decided against telling Lydia about what they found. It was for her own safety, even though she'd go off on them for it later.

Stiles hadn't taken his eyes off of Lydia since the incident. As the days dragged on, he made sure to be by her side as often as he possibly could. If she stayed at her house during the night, he sat in a chair beside her bed to make sure she wouldn't wander off. If she stayed with him, he also made sure that nothing bad would harm a single hair on her head. It was obvious that he had become physically exhausted, but he couldn't help it. The girl he loved since the third grade was viciously attacked on his watch. Or at least that's how he thought of it. If anything else happened to her - if any stupid creature would lay a nasty finger on her - then they'd have to come through him first.

Right before third period, Stiles got an urgent text from Allison. He didn't even read the entire thing before he broke out into a sprint to the parking lot. He wasn't risking anything. Not this time, not ever again.

Once he reached the pack, he hunched over out of breath and tried to ask what was going on, but it came out in a lot of breathiness instead. It took a minute for him to lift his head up, but when he finally did, he saw Lydia lying in the backseat of Allison's car. "What happened?" he asked with pure concern taking over his face. His heart started pounding as soon as he saw her. It was so bad that Scott and Isaac were about to tell him to calm down since that was one of the only things that they could hear.

"She almost passed out during trig," Allison explained. "She got hot and was unable to breathe for a second. Scott had his inhaler and she tried it, but it wasn't working." She was holding Lydia's hand while telling the whole story to Stiles. Her thumb was lightly stroking the back of the redheads hand as she gave her a look of sympathy. Allison was scared for the safety of her best friend, as was everyone else, but if she lost Lydia, she'd have to be locked up in Eichen for all of the crazy things that would pursue.

"Whatever it is, I could be an after effect from the claw," Scott started thinking out loud, but didn't realize what he said until Lydia shot up from her position.

The girl saw her vision go black and her body tingled all over as her head became extremely heavy, but she needed to know what Scott was talking about, even if it meant she passed out afterwards. "Claw?" She asked with wide eyes. "What claw?"

Isaac placed a hand on the alphas shoulder, signaling that he'd take over from there. "The doctors found a claw wedged into you after you were attacked," he explained slowly, wanting to back out of the awkward explanation before he was midway through his sentence. "We don't know what it is yet, but we took it to Deaton immediately. We're still waiting for him to call back."

With that, Lydia nodded her head and slowly laid back down. "Stiles?" She asked with a strained voice.

"Yeah, yeah?" He said, quickly pushing the two boys out of his way and to the car door. "Do you need something?"

"Can you take me home? Allison has a test next period that she can't miss."

The brunette laughed, "I can definitely skip it and make it up tomorrow."

Lydia shook her head, thinking that everyone's education was far more important than her health.

"I'll take you home," he promised her. "Help me move her to the Jeep," he told Scott, whom politely stepped in.

Once she was in the leaned back passenger seat, Scott took Stiles by the shoulder and pulled him towards him. "Keep an eye on her." He raised his eyebrows so Stiles would know that it was serious. "We can't lose her and we can't lose you either. Stay with her, okay?"

Stiles smiled, "I was already planning on it."

**x-x-x**

As soon as Stiles pulled up to Lydia's house, he carefully dragged her out of the seat and placed her on her unbalanced feet. "Do you have your key?"

Lydia very subtly nodded as she handed him her purse. "My dad always told me not to go through a ladies purse," he told her as he tried to hand it back. "At least not until you're a few blocks away," he laughed. "Just kidding. He's a cop. He could never say that."

Lydia was too much in her own daze to make a sarcastic comment about his poor joke and Stiles saw that and instead took her bag and rummaged through it to find her keys. "Let's get you to bed," he said as soon as he opened the door and waited for her to walk through.

"I don't think I can make it," Lydia said as her eyelids started to close, they were too heavy for the girl to keep open.

Stiles bit down on his bottom lip and scooped her up in his arms and headed upstairs to the girls bedroom. He was able to open her door without causing any damage to the girl and for that, he thought he should've earned a medal. As he was placing her down on her bed, he looked around the room and realized that after a few years, it still gave him the feeling that he got the first time he walked in when he was a sophomore. He had been there a few nights throughout the week, but he never realized that his breath hitched in his throat once he came through the door. Everything in the room was just so Lydia. It screamed Lydia and the scent was intoxicating to Stiles' senses. It was a bit too pink and purple for his liking, but he got over it immediately. It wasn't like he was going to argue with the girl about the color of her walls. It was too Lydia to even think about doing.

"Lay down with me," she demanded him. It wasn't supposed to sound like that, but Lydia was too sleepy for her own good and patted the spot next to her while pulling the blankets over her shoulders.

This wasn't the first time that she wanted him to sleep in the same bed either, but he hadn't done that at her house. It was Lydia Martin's room and everything about it was great, but now she wanted him next to her in her bed that smelt of strawberries and vanilla. Of course he wouldn't pass up the chance and gave in immediately. He wasn't surprised that the pillow he was using smelled exactly like her shampoo. He was surprised, however, when she flipped over and nestled her head against his shoulder and placed a hand on his chest. "Goodnight, Lydia," he said even though it was still morning.

"Goodnight," she smiled and drifted off to sleep right after the word escaped her mouth.

He wanted to move out of bed to do some research, but instead he realized just how tired he was and yawned. Sleeping next to Lydia was one of more comforting things in his life and he wasn't about to ruin either of their naps.


	6. The Sleepover

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey lovelies! I'm sorry that this took awhile to crank out, but I've been sick this week so I haven't really been in the right mind to do so. I'm not at all proud of this chapter because I can't write the way I normally would like to, but I hope you guys like it anyway. Again, I'm sorry for the wait, but I hope this satisfies your needs until the next chapter (:

"A _Wendigo_?" Stiles eyes grew wide as he pursed his lips together and threw his hands in the air. "A freakin' Wendigo?"

Scott and Deaton nodded at him in unison.

Stiles put a pause on his anger to raise his brows at the veterinarian. "What exactly is a Wendigo?" He knew he had overreacted deeply for a while there, but hearing that they knew of the creature that harmed Lydia riled him up. He couldn't help it. No matter what happened, Lydia Martin had one of the biggest spots in his heart.

Deaton let out a sigh, looking at the boy with a weary look. "They're half-beasts. They rely on cannibalism to live. It's possible that it put their nails in Lydia to keep her paralyzed while it fed.

Stiles gave him a nod before the anger started to flow through his veins once more. He always realized that he was only human in these situations and it almost killed him, but he just wanted to protect his friends. Protect his pack. Protect the strawberry blonde he'd been in love with since the third grade. "How do we stop it? Or kill it. The latter seems like a more fitting option, don't you think?" He gave a glance at Scott before raising his hand up to his face and chewing on his nails. It was a nervous habit of his, especially because of all of the stress in their lives when it came to the supernatural.

Scott frowned at his friend, hating to tell him bad news. "We're not sure yet. Deaton's working on it."

Stiles swore that he could've passed out from the news, but instead nodded and rolled his eyes. " _Seriously_?" He waved a hand in the air, motioning to Scott, as he looked at Deaton.

"Seriously," Deaton confirmed. "Hopefully my contact will get back to me soon. Until then, we'll have to work on keeping Lydia as safe as possible incase it comes back."

x-x-x

Later that night, the redhead looked at her friends as if they were crazy. Scott, Stiles, and Isaac sighed as they frantically made their makeshift beds on the floor in order to give Lydia the full sized bed for herself. She couldn't believe that she was spending the night at the Stilinski house once again. It wasn't that she minded it, but she wanted to be at home. She felt safe enough to sleep in her own bed - alone – but all of her friends thought she'd be safer with them. She felt as if they knew something that she didn't, but she wouldn't beat it out of them just yet. Not until she felt danger coming on once again. "Do you guys have to do this? I feel like having just one of you around would be enough."

"Stiles couldn't stop you on your own," Isaac commented, not realizing that he was being a tad rude. Of course, straightaway Stiles shot him a death glare before returning back to placing blankets on the ground.

Scott shook his head at his friend before looking over at Lydia. "No, it's because if anything happens, you'll have an Alpha to protect you. We're not letting you get hurt again, Lydia. Please don't argue with us for keeping you safe." After he was finished talking, he looked over at her, giving his puppy eyes that would make anyone weak in less than a second. He knew that she couldn't turn his facial expression away even if she tried hard enough.

"Fine," she said as she sat down on the bed with a huff. "Does Isaac really have to be here, though?"

"Would you rather have Derek here?" Isaac asked with a scowl.

"I retract my previous question."

"Thought so." Isaac raised a brow at her while grinning. There was something about him that irritated Lydia, but she had to admit that he could come in handy every now and then. He _had_ stopped her from getting killed by Alison's arrow once which made him more trustworthy than some with her life.

"Hey," Stiles shot up from his spot on the floor, "since everyone's here, can I please introduce you to Star Wars?"

"No!" They all screamed in unison.

"No need to take up an attitude." Stiles sighed and threw himself back on the ground, forgetting that he wasn't in his bed for once. Since he had gotten his bed ready, he wondered about asking Lydia if he could share the bed with her again. Stiles had really taken to falling asleep with her head on his chest and his hand on the small of her back. Granted, it might've been a bit awkward since the guys were over, but they knew as well as the rest of the world that Stiles adored the girl.

"Maybe we should all get some sleep," Scott suggested as he rolled over to face everyone.

Lydia nodded as she let out a yawn. "I second that. It's not like we get much sleep as is." She slid down in the bed, covering herself with Stiles' blankets and melting into the mattress. She, too, wondered why Stiles wasn't up there next to her, but she brushed that thought out of her mind. "Goodnight, guys."

"Goodnight," Stiles and Scott said back.

"Isaac?" Lydia asked after not hearing his voice. Afterwards, she heard the light snores coming from the corner of the room that he was in. The girl smiled to herself, thankful that Isaac was finally getting the rest that he and the rest of the pack deserved.

x-x-x

Isaac awoke in the dark room, feeling groggy from waking up. His eyes scanned the room to look for the alarm clock on Stiles' bedside table. 3:47 AM. The boy nodded to himself, wondering why he wasn't able to sleep all through the night. He stood up and stretched, needing to head to the bathroom, but that's when he spotted it. Lydia missing from the bed. He searched frantically in the covers for her small frame, but she was nowhere to be found. His eyes darted to the window in the bedroom only to realize that it was left wide open, the cold nights breeze flowing through the air and sending a shiver up his spine. "You guys," Isaac said loud enough, trying to get them to wake up. When they didn't, get got down on his knees and placed his hands on their shoulders. "Wake up! Lydia's gone."

The teenagers instantly shot their eyes open, hoping that he wasn't being serious. When they hadn't made a single noise, Isaac pointed towards the open window and frowned. "We have to go find her," Scott groaned as he leaned on his elbows. "She needs us."

Stiles was fast on his feet and stood up without complaining, even through his sleepiness, and grabbed the keys to his Jeep before heading out the door, leaving the werewolves behind to follow his tracks.

"Where do you think she'd be?" Scott whispered, not wanting to wake the sheriff as they crept through the hallway past his door.

Stiles shrugged on impulse. "She said she wanders off into the woods."

"Not to freak you out, but half of Beacon Hills is woods."

"Shut up, Isaac," Stiles groaned. "Do you even know how to be sensitive?"

"Hey, I'm only trying to help."


End file.
